The Calgary Flames will look to avoid a letdown after an emotional night Tuesday, in which they earned a 3-0 victory over the Blue Jackets with an excellent performance. Calgary features some of the most pronounced home-and-road splits in the league, as it now holds a record of 10-3-0 at the ‘Dome this season.

The St. LouisBlues also enter off an excellent win, as they bested the Jets 4-1 Tuesday in Winnipeg. They are now 3-0-1 under new head coach Jim Montgomery.

I’ll detail the relevant game notes, as well as outline my favourite betting angle below.

The ‘new-coach bounce’ has hit the Blues hard thus far, albeit in a small sample. In four games under Montgomery they have already earned three regulation wins over quality opponents, and their only loss came in 3-on-3 play versus a red-hot Flyers side.

In those four match-ups they hold a 57.23% expected goal share, which is quite impressive given the slate of opponents played. They have allowed just six goals in that span, and limited opponents to 27.38 shots against per 60.

They have also benefited from Philip Broberg’s return to the lineup, who has averaged 24 minutes of time on ice in his first two games back. Broberg has taken considerable steps forward after a solid playoff run with the Oilers, and ranks second to Colton Parayko among Blues defenders in expected goals above replacement this season.

Time will tell whether the Blues will be able to maintain this level over a larger sample, as the roster does still look fairly limited. They generated just 2.85 goals per game last season, and scored just 2.54 goals per game this season.

Outside of Robert Thomas, Jordan Kyrou and Pavel Buchnevich they aren’t offering much in the way of offensive needle-movers, and it’s hard to say a coaching change will allow them to produce above average offence over a larger sample. And while this season’s results would look better if Thomas hadn’t missed a second period of time, they are now fighting through the absence of Buchnevich up front.

Jordan Binnington is expected to get the start in goal. He has followed up his excellent 2023-24 campaign with a +0.6 GSAx and .898 save % across 19 appearances, and earned a spot on Canada’s Four Nations Cup team in the process.

The Flames enter this match-up in the midst of a six-game winning streak on home ice, and have allowed just 1.16 goals against per game in that span.

On Tuesday the Flames allowed just eight high danger chances against a Columbus side which entered the match-up in excellent form offensively, and allowed just 16 shots against.

Flames fans’ have been treated to plenty of dominant defensive performances this season, as they enter this game with an eighth best GAA of 2.81. Generating meaningful offensive totals continues to prove highly difficult though, as they rank 27th having scored an average of just 2.54 goals per game.

The last time Calgary scored four goals inside of regulation was on Oct. 13 in Edmonton, and in those 24 games it ranks last in the NHL with just 2.25 goals per game. They have generated 2.96 xGF/60 in that span which suggests some positive regression could be coming, but a lack of truly dynamic offensive threats is clearly the roster’s biggest fault right now.

It’s unclear whether this start will go to Dan Vladar or Dustin Wolf. While Vladar holds strong numbers of his own and earned a shutout on Tuesday, Wolf has a superior save percentage of .917, as well as a +5.4 GSAx rating.

Justin Kirkland and Anthony Mantha are the only players on the Flames IR entering this match-up.

The Blues have offered vastly improved defensive play under Jim Montgomery, which is far from surprising given what we saw during his lengthy tenure with the Bruins. The Flames haven’t scored four goals inside of regulation in more than a month, and I’m not sure that will change in this match-up.

The Blues offensive attack still looks quite modest though, and this match-up provides a great opportunity for Wolf and the Flames continue their dominant stretch of play defensively on home ice.

At +100 I see value backing the game to stay under 5.5 total goals, and would bet it down to -105.